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tv   [untitled]    December 20, 2012 9:30am-10:00am PST

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president delanus and i will make every effort to work with the chief as we have done since being on the executive board of the poa for the last 9 years. but before i do i want to acknowledge kevin martin who has 28 years of service not just with the san francisco police department but the san francisco sheriff's department and especially acknowledge steve johnson, who joined the san francisco police department in 1971, served 30 years and since that time has worked tirelessly along with kevin for the rights of our members and he has worked with every commissioner here. he's going to be a big loss to the poa, he wanted to be here tonight, he could not make it. he is in good health and spirits but i do have letters to each one of the commissioners on behalf of steve. so i am available, i certainly am behind the learning curve but considering the statement from one of the last speakers i hope the chief grants everything that the poa requests as you did the
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previous speaker. i can answer any questions if you have them, but thank you for your time. >> thank you, inspector hallorran. i want to say, inspector halloran, we recognize vice president martin, one of our hearings we closed in honor of him, for all the work he's done for police officers but also all the work he did walking the weet. he started the job as a police special, a service officer, he was a lot like the next person we're going to talk about, steve johnson. they are more than just a police officer, i think there was a bit of a priest in each of them. he's been greatly missed. with reference to steve johnson, i think president delanus, he referred to him as mother teresa he'd come before this commission and explain away any sort of thing that happened to a police officer,
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had a way of explaining it and convincing the commission in most cases that the officer should get a second chance. a lot of officers owe their careers to him and he will be sorely missed. commissioner kingsley. >> i just wanted to thank you for coming here this evening and speaking to us and letting us know about this and being the mass -- messenger for the letter from officer martin. please if you would convey our thanks to both officers and our best wishes for a wonderful retirement life. >> thank you. would you please call line item no. 2. >> line item 3? >> 3, excuse me. thank you. >> no problem. >> been a long week. >> line item 3, reports and announcements. chief's, discussion, review of recent activities. >> commissioners, occ, public,
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as far as crime statistics go, total violent crime in the city remains relatively flat. our property crime is up about 9 percent, arrests are up, which is understandable, about 9 percent in addressing that. with regard to statistics, though, we did uncover yet another gap as we get better technologically, captain flaherty in preparation for our last meeting with the commission on status of women saw that the stats for db numbers, she felt they were a bit low. she discovered the reporting was for the fiscal year, she got with director giffin and looked at them for the calendar year and indeed they were low. i ordered an immediate audit for all of our numbers and we discovered when we changed over approximately 8,000 police reports hadn't been scanned in for purposes of
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comstat. that obviously is going to click up our year to date statistics but at least they will be accurate. a lot of these reports were closed cases, warrants, things like that, not necessary of any follow-up but not wanting to risk anything, captain flaherty did an audit of the 106 cases that hadn't been scanned in that would have been svu cases, all had been followed up on, one needed specifically to be assigned and that's been taken so we don't have anything that slipped through the cracks. however, you will notice when you see the final year to date stats for 2012 that they will be different. i don't want anybody worried that there was a crime wave in december when we do the stats going into 2013. all of those events will fall into the months that they occurred. so there's that. >> if i could ask, will these updated statistics also be given to the commission on the status since we have that joint
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hearing with them? >> sure, i can make that happen. thank you, commissioner, for my lead-in. a good thing that happened in this audit was that if you look at the com stat report, we don't believe we've been exhaustively reporting our domestic violence numbers which have several more categories than are listed here. to that end i've asked susan to go back to the inception of com stat which actually predates me to 2010 and we're now going to take all of these numbers -- i'll pass these around but i need them back; these are my copies -- which you will see are far more exhaustive in reporting and they will be put in our com stat report so we will have a much more comprehensive report with regard to special victims in san francisco. we're going to need to go back to the very beginning because since the numbers are so many more, i don't want it to look like we had a big increase. it's going
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to be consistent from 2010 to 2011 and on. so that will be a good thing. as far as gun violence in san francisco, i know that that's a hot button issue right now. our homicide rate is at 67, which is up 30 some odd percent from last year, but the spike is pretty much attributed real specifically to the house street quipb quin tup quintupple homicide in april. overall gun violence in san francisco is down 7 percent when nationally gun violence is up pretty much across the board, so we have had good luck unfortunately though the fatal violence in san francisco due to those 3 windows that i described is up. it is, however, the fourth best year in the last 10 when
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you talk about totals. going back a little bit, obviously it bears mentioning what happened in newtown, connecticut, the unimaginable tragedy that everybody's been talking about nationally. i think it's important that everybody take notice that the teachers at that school and the officers that responded did so as we've been training since columbine also here in san francisco and i think were it not for the heroic efforts of both the teachers and officers that that tragedy would have been way worse. the teachers, instead of evacuating and emptying those kids into the hallway, secured in place which kept them safe. actually it cost some of the teachers their lives, god bless them, and then the police officers as you saw them come on scene went straight into the school, which is exactly what san francisco police officers would do when there's the immediate imnepblt
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danger of serious danger of death, active shooter we'll go straight in. it's our job to put ourselves in harm's way and the cops in connecticut did that. on a very different note -- oh, i'm sorry -- we will be reinitiating our active shooter training that most of us that have been in the department for a while all went through to train for this, but as we're hiring a thousand recruits and working with the school district to make it part of the site we'll make it part of our academy basic training so we don't lose track of that. anybody from the school district is more than welcome to come see how we do it and we're passing out our crisis management hand book that tells when to evacuate and when to remain in place and our presence has been felt tremendously since the date of this incident. we've gotten some very favorable reviews on our two officerses, i know commissioner
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zucco and a very teary officer loftus were at bayview when officers gritch and cloud very genuinely relayed the accounts of that night when they saved little baby nash, so we will be putting them up for obviously all sorts of recognition, not the least of which will be a life saving award at this commission. i spent saturday with commissioner marshall. we underestimated -- what do they say -- we underpromised and overdelivered. we didn't know if we would end up getting a hundred guns and we got nearly 300 guns. the commissioner received them himself and then we just recently today got clearance from washington that we can pay the balance off and i don't know if the check was delivered today, if not it will be tomorrow so that we can make good on all our iou's and everybody that turnd in
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firearms, standing in the rain, making sure that the guns that they had could not be taken, ended up being 163 handguns, 68 rifles, some hunting, some military, 25 shotguns and countless rounds of ammunition, all off the streets of san francisco. oakland took 300 guns as well totaling 600 guns off the streets of the bay area in one saturday. so that's a good thing. and then finally we did some promotions. we did 8 captains, they have been assigned, 15 lieutenants, they have also been lieutenants, and 29 sergeants, the entire group is in the academy right now and they will go to their respective assignments on saturday and as we close out the holiday season we did bayview toy give away today, mission station and api on bay shore was on saturday and obviously operation dream in various joy give aways will be
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going forward the rest of the holiday season. and that concludes my report. >> well, thank you, chief. speaking of the real positive news, the press conference with officers cloud and gritch, it wasn't only commissioner loftus that was crying, it was maybe another commissioner. >> i didn't want to be the one that said it, i'm glad you said it. >> even our commission secretary who has done a lot with this department had tears in his eyes. it was an incredible press conference. what those two officers did was beyond belief, saving that little baby's life. it was amazing. god bless them, they did the lord's work, they are great police officers and to hear the officer that was driving the radio car while the other officer was giving cpr to the baby because they couldn't wait for the ambulance, to hear him say the officer giving cpr was crying and telling the baby to come back, it made me to be commissioner representing the
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officer and the public. i would like to bring them back in january so everyone can meet them before they go up for their life saving award which i imagine is pretty many a slam dunk. >> i'll make sure that happens. >> on the second part, we are seeing an uptick from schools to having our officers come out and make an assessment. being the husband of a teacher, i know this is first and foremost of the teachers, they spent all weekend receiving emails from school officials how to handle things. how many requests have you had and what have we done and what are we prepared to do other than what you have already said? >> again, we have been working very closely with the unified school district, a lot of requests, some personal, some through our city capacity. any requests that have been asked have been answered, captains have been told to make sure their officers are visibly
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present before school and after school and made contact with all the principals' offices just to let them know we're here, we're around, and as the link goes out to print out the crisis management hand book, the officers will make another visit to the school offices to make sure it's been printed and they know where it is. we're not putting ourselves on the schools, we just want to know they know we're around. >> as we close our meeting in honor of those victims tonight, commissioner kingsley of all the commissioners knows more about gun violence than any of us and commissioner kingsley will address that issue. we want to be the first -- we want to be at the forefront of this and see what our police department can do. many of us including myself think the second amendment is clearly outdated but what can we do
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within our power as a commission to make things safer in san francisco. i want to turn it over to commissioner kingsley. >> thank you, president mazzucco, i wanted to thank the chief for his report but clarify the homicide number. the 67 homicides, were all of them, is it all of them involve gun violence? >> no, 45. >> 45. i wanted to make sure that that number was right. so 45 involved gun violence and then congratulations to a successful gun buy back in omega boy's and girl's club is to be congratulated on that success as well. thanks to everybody involved in that, the department. >> i really do have to give, as i say, i have to give props to omega boy's club. we were happy to be a part of it but the commissioner stepped up. >> well, if i may, i just got
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to say it was something we didn't expect, i mean, i thought we would get 50 guns. i was not prepared for the line that showed up. it was scheduled for 10:00 am, at 9:00 people were out there. i've never seen so many guns in my life, i don't want to see that many guns again. and i think the chief came by and brought some more officers in because we weren't moving things along fast enough. you'll be surprised, i have to do this publicly, supervisor malia cohen came by and helped the process along. anybody knows her, she jumped into things, it was a rainy day, i have to thank the public, they were very, very patient, amazingly patient standing outside in those lines and then coming in inside the rain, they stood there until we got every
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firearm processed. this was one of those unique things where it was, you know, the factors you like to see involved. a private donor who put up the first part of the money, a community organization and law enforcement. and the next part of it happened on both sides of the bay. i mean i know captain joiner in oakland said it was the first time he had ever seen this kind of collaborative effort between -- for this particular purpose. the fact that it was going on, on both sides of the bay at the same time and both of us accomplishing way more than we hoped to do was just an amazing thing. and then, chief, i got to thank you for those. at some point the grant money that we had ran out and i was going to go out and tell everybody to go home. but you saw those
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guns and said, oh, hell, no, we got to get those guns. so we'll get the funding. it was definitely a win-win and i must say that the 3 reasons that i heard the most that people showed up was the monetary incentive; secondly was folks that had these guns wanted to get rid of them but a whole lot of folks said the events of the night before said they didn't want their guns to fall into somebody's hands because everybody knows by now that the young man got the guns from his mother. the hold phrase of too many guns on the street, we got 600. i have heard, i don't know if you have, but i heard folks are now talking about doing a state-wide gun buy back and i've already had calls today about, you know, i got some more guns, but we're not ready for that yet.
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thanks a lot to everybody concerned and, you know, we did really do something that i think is very, very meaningful and that's getting 600 guns off the street and i hope we're able to do more sometime. thank you. >> thank you, chief. please call the next line item. >> line item 3a -- 3b, occ director's report. >> good evening. >> good evening. we're not going to give a report tonight. as you mentioned, commissioner, director hicks will be back and we'll do it in january. >> thank you very much. please call 3c >> commission reports, commission president's report, discussion ?oo ?a i've already given my report, commissioners, anything you'd like to add?
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commissioner kingsley. >> i want to let my fellow commissioners know on the commissions we have for the november and december months i have reviewed the dgo810 report and signed off on that and for anybody that is not aware of what the dgo810 is about, essentially the police commission has the responsibility to review the report that's prepared by the department in connection with law enforcement on criminal matters in relationship to second amendment activities. and the commission is responsible for looking at that report and reviewing it for compliance and signing off on it. so let you know that happened. >> thank you very much, commissioner kingsley.
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commissioner loftus. >> yes, i just had a couple things. i think we talked a lot about the bravery and heroism and the crying, especially on my part, around officer gritch and cloud and thanks, commissioner mazzucco. i think it's important, i said it then, we often talk about what's wrong with the department and that's definitely a role we have and something we have to do, but it's important to talk just as much about what's right with the department and to be present when the officers were recounting finding this baby that wasn't raining and it was raining at 2:00 am and going under a muni stop, i'm sure you all have stories like this, all the 2,000 officers that we don't see, have these stories where you are called for this service. a lot of being a police officer is going into harm's way when there's a shooter and a lot of it is being the only person that can save a life. i was really
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proud of these officers. they are like celebrities to me, i was taking pictures with my i phone. i look forward to the awards that are going to be coming. the second thing was the department participated in the attorney general's review of the state of human trafficking in california. i talked a little bit about this at our joint meeting, but that report was issued, i'm sure that i see lieutenant jean is here, i know the department is looking at some human trafficking efforts and some collaborative work and there's a number of recommendations in there. just for the commission i think there will be some interesting things for us to look at recommendation-wise. the third thing has to do with the tragedy in connecticut. my day job is we're building a center in bayview to address the impact of adverse childhood experience and exposure to violence and trauma on children. obviously this type of trauma is in a league of its own. but one of the experts we work with is dr. victor care 81 from stanford and he shared
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with me and i shared with my daughter's school so i want to share with everyone, a lot of us are hearing recommendations on the today show but we benefit from the bayview area with having access to these experts. i want to share these recommendations on children exposed to violence. the first is that we should reduce exposure, children need protection from the media, which is pretty intuitive but a good reminder for me. talking about the event should not be clear but lines of discourse should be open. provide a message of safety and i think that's what we're talking about here, especially the police department represents that. let children know we're here to protect them and it's our responsibility to keep them safe and finally, i think this was president mazzucco's question, seek help when needed. special populations will be at risk now. i wanted
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to share that information, that's part of my day job and make sure people can benefit from that. >> thank you very much. commissioners, anything further? please call line item 3d >> commission announcements and scheduling of items identified for consideration at future meetings. action. >> thank you, commissioners, commissioner turman. >> i wanted to announce that in keeping with our public hearings the commission, the oca and department, to hold meetings with the department regarding options we have arrived at a schedule. we are starting a little bit later than expected on the schedule, which will begin in 2013, that is through no fault of the department. it was mostly through having to schedule around the commissioner, myself in particular, because we
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wanted to make sure that all 3 members of the commission subcommittee would be able to be present. that committee being myself, commissioner chan from this office along with the department, the occ and member s of the public. and the dates which will be announced publicly, put up on our web site and announced in other ways, those dates are january 22nd, 2013, from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at the hamilton recreation center. february 4, 2013 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at the scotish rites center and february 8, 2013, at the bayview opera house. so that information will be made available to the public, we hope to have as much participation from a wide array of san franciscoans as possible. thank you. >> thank you. commissioner
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kingsley. >> in light of what happened in newtown, connecticut, last friday i think it has focused the attention of all of us throughout the country in whatever capacity we live and work in, but particularly those of us that are working in some way with law enforcement. and we have the attention of folks around us now, the communities at large around this issue. what happened on friday is truly off the chart and beyond belief because children, large numbers of children, were the victims in this instance. at the same time when these mass killings, these mass shootings
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occur, everybody becomes very upset and distraught about it and little actually happens. a larger problem are the 30-plus,000 people that die from gun violence each year. another part of this problem. and i propose that while we have our focus on this that this commission focuses on reducing gun violence in san francisco. as the chief indicated, 45 of the homicides this year related to gun violence. there are probably other results or other deaths from guns from suicides, et cetera, that aren't included in that number. as the chief has always said in reporting some of these statistics, our
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numbers are down in relation to history. our numbers aren't what some of our neighboring communities are experiencing. but at the same time 45 are 45 too many. so i would propose that this commission commit to expending some time and energy and effort working with the department, some of the members of the commission working with the department and the chief has indicated, just confirmed what is already very apparent, his willingness and readiness to work on this issue and president mazzucco has also expressed concern and dedication for us to be looking at this as well. so i propose that we do
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address this. we decide on a time and a meeting to allow the community to come forward and tell us, you know, what their thoughts and feelings are in terms of gun violence in this city or measures that could be taken, but that we also look at it from a professional law enforcement perspective and invite the other, you know, key players in the city, the mayor's office, the board of supervisors, occ, of course, and everybody to, you know, roll up their sleeves and look at the best of what's out there professionally to see if we can't improve on our statistics in san francisco. so that's my proposal on the table. >> i agree. if we can have a presentation with the community present and have the chief explain about what our police department does, for example, with atf in terms of taking guns off the street, i know
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there's programs in place with that. just anything we can do to help. as i'll say, we're going to close this meeting tonight and commissioner kingsley is going to close the meeting in honor of the victims in connecticut, she'll have some things to say then, but gun violence has had an adverse impact on members of this commission and i see this as an opportunity to protect others from that. >> if i can add, i think anything we do in the city based on the recent collaboration we just had would certainly be welcome by everyone. you and i know, criminals travel, guns travel. i think anything we do they would certainly want to know about, maybe be part of, maybe listen to, and i think that has to happen because, you know, like i say, this is not a local issue, obviously. people travel all the time. so i